Russia Stands With Syria ... But Why?

8/30/2013 7:09PM

Russia has declined to back military action against Syria and has offered the country weapons support. Will Mauldin, WSJ's former deputy bureau chief in Moscow, explains the connection between the two nations.

This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.

I ... Russia and Syria have a relationship going back decades ... most recently in Soviet times the two had accounted tepid relationship ... after Soviet times Russia managed to keep a military base in fact enable insulation and Chartres on the Mediterranean ... There is also some forgiveness by Moscow awesome Soviet era debt ... and Russia has stayed pretty close with Syria ... similar to the way Iran has stayed close to Syria ... as one of its few remaining allies in the region ... after the fall of Gadhafi Libya ... Syria is one of the few places ... where the Kremlin has close ties in the area ... so with regular connections between Moscow in Damascus that support has ratcheted up a level in Syria began civil war ... Moscow has refused to back any UN sanctions or ... resolutions that would involve a conflict in Syria ... and has since become closely attached to Syria as a supporter ... condition of an arms shipments to Syria ... relatively advanced weapons that can be used to shoot incoming planes ... and they are ... becoming closer since the start of the soul war ... now things are looking a bit more difficult hour for the relationship ... because it appears that the US and possibly other countries could strike Syrian in retaliation ... for chemical weapons attacks that occurred in Syria ... Russia may be running out of cars to play ... and may have trouble going on a limb to protect its ally ... the regime of the side ... in the next few days or weeks or months the Syria rush relationship might change inevitably ... tied to something completely different ... for The Wall Street Journal this is Will malt and Washington ...